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University  of  California  •  Berkeley 


SOPHIA  TRENTON 

A   MORAL   POEM 

BY  LEONARD  BACON 


[Phi  Beta  Kappa  Poem  at  Stanford  University,  June  19, 1920 
Reprinted  from  the  Chapter  Proceedings] 


SOPHIA  TRENTON 

A   MORAL   POEM 

BY  LEONARD  BACON 


[Phi  Beta  Kappa  Poem  at  Stanford  University,  June  19, 1920 
Reprinted  from  the  Chapter  Proceedings] 


SOPHIA  TRENTON 

A   MORAL   POEM 

"The  relation  of  organism  to  organism 
is  the  most  important  of  all  relations." — 
DARWIN,  The  Origin  of  Species. 

1. 

The  Autumn  sun  streamed  through  the  lecture-room. 

Girls  swished  into  their  seats  with  clicks  and  clatters. 

Without,  the  trolleys  rushed  by  with  a  boom, 

As  if  intent  upon  tremendous  matters. 

A  gay  wind  bent  the  maple's  ragged  plume 

Against  the  window,  tossing  the  leaves  in  tatters. 

Sophia  Trenton  in  the  foremost  row 

Felt  strange  and  homesick  and  extremely  low. 

2. 

She  was  not  like  a  flower,  (my  heroines 
Are  painted  as  a  homely  muse  dictates), 
Nor  wicked  as  the  seven  deadly  sins, 
Nor  the  sweetest  of  girl-undergraduates. 
Nor  was  she  one  with  ruthless  hand  that  spins 
The  twisted  thread  of  other  people's  fates. 
Frankly  in  talents,  as  in  form  and  face, 
Sophia  was  a  little  commonplace. 

3. 

Still  she  had  freshness  and  a  morning-look. 
"Everyone,"  say  the  French,  "is  fair  at  twenty." 
Her  bosom,  as  she  bent  above  her  book, 
Had  the  right  curve  to  please  the  cognoscenti, 
And  her  mouth's  corner  had  a  pleasant  crook, 
Implying  dimples,  when  she  smiled,  in  plenty. 
She  was  not  smiling  now.    Of  all  things  human, 
Nothing's  so  lonely  as  a  shy  freshwoman. 


Y  K  A ti  E  U -T 1 0  S  0 'It /; £    3  U  V 


SOPHIA   TRENTON 


4. 

She  thought  of  the  white  house  in  Schuyler  Falls 
And  morning-glories  by  the  picket-fence. 
It  only  made  Columbia's  clanging  halls 
Seem  more  impersonal  and  more  immense. 
Dull  times  there  are  when  memory  appalls. 
And  she  was  overwhelmed  by  the  cold  sense 
That  she  had  lost  more  than  could  e'er  be  garnered 
At  Morningside,  particularly  at  Barnard. 

5. 

She  thought  of  the  "apartment"  twelve  by  ten, 
That  gave  upon  the  grimy  court  and  chill, 
Of  dawn  she  had  not  hated  until  then, 
Of  a  heavy  sun  that  somehow  lacked  the  will 
To  scale  uninteresting  skies  again, 
Of  coal-dust-flecked  milk-bottles  on  her  sill, 
Of  cats,  at  midnight  in  adjacent  yards, 
Howling  their  passions  much  like  modern  bards. 

6. 

Just  then  all  point  device,  and  brisk,  and  right 
Upon  the  dot,  the  lecturer  came  in — 
A  startling  man  to  her,  for  any  might 
Have  startled  her,  who  checked  pale  thought  within. 
Perhaps  the  future  held  some  haggard  light. 
Quiet  came  o'er  the  rustle  and  the  din. 
It  might  be  glory  had  not  all  departed. 
A  street  car  clanged  far  off.  The  lecture  started. 

7. 

The  lecturer's  voice  was  good.   Its  pleasant  sound 
Came  sweet  upon  her  ears — a  mellow  timbre 
That  suited  well  his  theme  somehow,  who  round 
The  mountains  of  Romance  appeared  to  clamber, 
And  to  walk  safe  upon  enchanted  ground 
Where  he  found  treasures  of  pure  gold  and  amber, 
Which  he  revealed  to  awestruck  contemplation 
As  the  true  basis  of  an  education. 


A   MORAL   POEM 


8. 

The  lecture  was  a  poem  in  its  way, 
At  least  free  verse,  unusually  free, 
Although  in  this  it  differed,  I  must  say, 
Being  allusive  in  a  high  degree. 
He  quoted  much  from  poets  grave  and  gay, 
And  his  voice  leaped  when  he  said  'poetry/ 
So  that  Sophia  taxed  her  wandering  wit, 
Wondering  if  he  perhaps  were  fond  of  it. 

9. 

And  much  she  heard  that  struck  her  with  amazement, 
Queer  phrases  full  of  sounds  and  fever-heats, 
Catchwords  of  ecstasy  and  of  abasement 
In  which  the  imprisoned  spirit  throbs  and  beats. 
He  slammed  the  sash  of  many  a  magic  casement. 
(Little  Sophia  had  not  read  her  Keats, 
Although  sad  Ruth  was  never  more  forlorn, 
Sick — sick  for  her  home  amid  the  alien  corn.) 

10. 

He  told  them  Shelley  was  the  pioneer 

Of  spiritual  poetry,  whose  ways 

Led  over  heights  so  awful  that  men  fear 

To  follow — that  his  verse  was  all  ablaze 

With  light — and  that  the  pure  in  spirit  hear 

A  faery  melody  in  Adonais, 

And  the  world-revolution's  dreadful  sound 

Trumpeting  when  Prometheus  is  unbound. 

11. 

Then  with  a  swift  transition  on  he  went. 
Nothing  is  swifter  than  a  swift  transition; 
Not  Congress  on  appropriation  bent, 
Nor  troops  that  storm  an  enemy's  position, 
Nor  financiers  on  dividends  intent, 
Nor  the  rightabout  of  a  skilled  politician. 
When  changing  ground,  a  lecturer  of  tact 
Beats  these  and  wireless — everything  in  fact. 


SOPHIA   TRENTON 


12. 

"The  Greeks,"  he  said,  "Parthenon — violet  crown — 
Sappho" — he  lingered  with  a  languorous  air 
On  the  words  as  though  he  loved  them.    Up  and  down 
Her  spine  she  tingled,  flushing  to  her  hair. 
And  though  she  might  have  wondered,  I  must  own, 
As  Pope  says,  "how  the  devil  he  got  there," 
She  was  much  thrilled  instead,  though  by  the  way, 
She  thought  that  Sappho  was  a  lewd  French  play. 

13. 

Now  many  a  half-thought  was  half-suggested, 
And  now  he  paused  on  demi-dreams  to  dwell. 
Sophia  thought  that  she  was  interested, 
Although  in  what  it  had  been  hard  to  tell. 
Somehow  she  felt  the  powers  of  evil  bested, 
And  the  big  devil  bound  fast  again  in  Hell 
With  chains  of  words,  although  I  can't  conjecture 
How  this  could  be  accomplished  by  a  lecture. 

14. 

Those  Greeks  he  spoke  of — with  her  shining  eyes 
She  saw  them  suddenly.  They  ceased  to  be 
The  half-tone  figures  of  school  histories. 
Now  they  gleamed  out  upon  her  flamingly. 
Large,  gracefully  audacious,  calm  and  wise 
Creatures  she  thought  of,  and  could  almost  see 
Halfway  between  the  actual  and  ideal. 
Suddenly  she  knew  that  they  had  once  been  real. 

15. 

This  be  it  known  the  lecturer  did  not  know, 
And  never  had  been  led  even  to  suspect. 
He  was  not  a  bad  fellow  as  men  go, 
But  frankly  he  was  after  an  effect, 
A  practice  which  is  apt  to  bring  men  low. 
Witness  how  many  poets  have  been  wrecked 
Upon  that  rock.    He  had  woven  all  his  web 
Out  of  the  bowels  of  Sir  Richard  Jebb, 


A    MORAL   POEM 


16. 

And  Gilbert  Murray.    Twenty  years  before 

Himself  to  learning  had  John  Percy  given, 

A  sacrifice  to  literary  lore, 

By  the  fierce  whips  of  the  twin-devils  driven, 

Poverty  and  Vanity,  who  overbore 

Judgment.    And  it  had  seemed  a  glimpse  of  heaven 

That  vision  of  long  academic  calm, 

Laborious,  earnest,  pleasant  as  a  palm. 

17. 

So  he  was  actor  on  that  meaner  stage 
Whose  sole  prop  is  the  professorial  chair. 
He  played  his  part,  expounding  many  a  page 
Where  never  difficulty  lurked  in  lair. 
Thence  many  a  notion  did  he  disengage, 
Especially  notions  that  were  not  there. 
(In  the  interests  of  the  stricter  metricality 
Notion  I  wrote  instead  of  triviality.) 

18. 

And  he  was  very  greatly  to  be  pitied, 

And  yet  more  pitiable,  alas !  he  knew  it, 

For  he  had  been  irrevocably  committed 

To  talk  about  a  thing  and  not  to  do  it. 

Men  suffer  thus  however  nimble-witted, 

And  find  not,  though  they  seek  peace  and  ensue  it, 

Their  minds  in  a  perpetual  bereavement, 

Wanting  the  strong  embraces  of  achievement. 

19. 

Not  that  he  was  not  highly  publicatious, 
Each  year  a  volume  more  or  less  he  tallied — 
The  simulacrum  of  a  book,  but  Gracious ! 
What  reader  e'er  so  hardy  ever  rallied 
His  forces  to  the  sticking-point  audacious, 
And  faced  that  ghost  of  learning  thin  and  pallid? 
Ah !  never,  never  shall  that  reader  be 
Saving  perhaps  another  Ph.  D., 


8 


20. 

Who  with  great  show  of  learning  shall  refute 
That  which  already  has  been  self-refuted, 
And  multiply  the  matter  in  dispute, 
Merely  to  be  himself  in  turn  disputed. 
So  rushes  on  the  circular  pursuit, 
And  will  I  fear  till  Gabriel's  horn  is  tooted. 
But  the  interruption  of  the  Day  of  Doom 
Once  o'er,  I'm  sure  the  champions  will  resume. 

21. 

Here  to  be  frank,  like  Sterne  I  own  I  hanker 
After  digressions.    This  is  a  confession. 
They  help  one  when  the  cerebellum's  blanker 
Than  minds  of  students  at  the  summer-session. 
When  the  brains  are  out,  then  there  is  no  sheet-anchor 
To  windward  better  than  a  long  digression. 
And  I  have  noted  all  men  more  or  less 
Display  a  disposition  to  digress. 

22. 

My  pseudo-hero,  whom  I  have  compounded 
Out  of  the  traits  of  several  men  I  know, 
My  pseudo-heroine,  in  short,  dumbfounded. 
She  felt  her  whole  mentality  a-glow. 
Her  ship  was  on  a  sea  unknown,  unbounded, 
Where  the  trade-winds  of  easy  doctrine  blow 
In  the  mind's  tropic.    Nor  was  there  one  to  say 
How  very  near  the  listless  doldrums  lay. 

23. 

That  term  she  harked  to  Percy's  every  lecture, 

And  read  the  poets  that  he  indicated, 

As  if  you  could  by  reading  them  effect  your 

Spirit's  salvation,  and  be  elevated 

To  sit  with  saints  in  robes  of  seamless  texture. 

And  now  and  then  after  the  hour  she  waited 

To  ask  him  how  she  could  improve  her  themes, 

And,  inadvertently,  revealed  small  dreams, 


24. 

Shy  little  verses  which  were  all  her  art. 
(Briefness  was  the  sole  beauty  not  refused  them,) 
And  Percy  of  the  goodness  of  his  heart 
Quoted  them  at  the  Club  where  he  perused  them 
Each  noon,  until  the  ritual  grew  a  part 
Of  luncheon.    With  much  humor  he  abused  them. 
And  poor  Sophia's  rondelays  and  ballads 
Came  on  the  menu  like  the  fruits  and  salads. 

25. 

He  said  she  was  a  type.    Beware  of  him 

Who  says  that  anybody  is  a  type 

Of  anything.   It  means  his  sight  is  dim 

And  all  his  fruitage  of  the  mind  unripe. 

Though  Individuals  wither — life  is  grim — 

They  yet  retain  the  individual  stripe. 

And  the  different  manners  in  which  people  act 

Is  what  makes  up  the  fun  of  life  in  fact. 

26. 

He  atnt  her  to  the  College  Magazine 

With  a  smart  letter  to  the  smart  Jew  Editor, 

Buttering  her  verse  with  oleomargarine. 

But  she  had  wanted  flattery,  and  he  fed  it  her, 

Till  she  was  happy  as  a  movie-queen. 

Never  was  debtor  gratefuller  to  creditor 

For  ten  days  grace  than  she,  who  now  by  dint 

Of  her  simplicity  appeared  in  print. 

27. 

And  thus  she  met  the  undergraduate  poet, 
And  worse  the  undergraduate  poetess, 
Self-styled  originals  who  thought  to  show  it 
In  eccentricity  of  hair  and  dress. 
Their  aim  was  moderate,  but  they  hit  below  it. 
They  loved  their  lucubrations  none  the  less. 
And  in  a  down-town  tavern  once  a  week 
They  gathered  for  high  discourse  on  technique. 


10 SOPHIA   TRENTON 

28. 

Technique !   The  very  word  is  like  the  shriek 
Of  outraged  Art.    It  is  the  idiot  name 
Given  to  effort  by  those  who  are  too  weak, 
Too  weary,  or  too  dull  to  play  the  game. 
The  mighty  have  no  theory  of  technique, 
But  leave  it  to  the  blind,  the  halt,  the  lame, 
"Mental  non-combatants,"  and  paralytics, 
Second-story  men  of  letters  and  small  critics. 

29. 

Though  why  distinguish  ?   Since  the  birth  of  time 

Critics  have  been  by  definition  small, 

Wishing  rather  to  commit  a  little  crirne 

Than  never  to  commit  a  crime  at  all. 

Therefore  they  rob  the  schoolgirl  of  her  dime, 

But  freely  give  the  two-gun  man  the  wall, 

Though  when  he's  past,  under  their  breath  they  mutter 

Small  insults  that  aloud  they  dare  not  utter. 

30. 

The  Sappho  of  those  Lesbians  was  a  Jewess, 
Swarthy  and  bosomed  like  a  pouter-pigeon. 
Israel  is  lean  sometimes,  but  what  more  true  is 
Than  that  maids  tend  to  fat  in  that  religion  ? 
Moses,  a  lawgiver  who  surely  knew  his 
People — in  a  most  unproductive  region — 
Observed  that  some  waxed  fat  and  were  grown  thick 
And  that  the  corpulent  were  apt  to  kick. 

31. 

And  Rachel  Stein  forsook  the  God  who  made  her, 
Esteeming  lightly  the  Rock  of  her  Salvation 
Just  like  Jeshurun.     From  the  social  nadir 
Of  Twentieth  Street  she  had  reached  the  elevation 
Of  Barnard.    She  prosed  much.    Once  some  one  paid  her 
For  a  sloppy  article  on  immigration 
And  the  melting-pot.    Accordingly  her  standing 
Throughout  Columbia's  Grub  Street  was  commanding. 


A    MORAL    POEM  11 

32. 

And  she  was  dull,  but  then  her  friends  were  duller. 
She  could  be  silent  with  a  certain  patness 
Better  than  speech.    And  her  talk  had  a  color 
That  in  some  sort  disguised  its  natural  flatness. 
Her  Rabbi  father  thought  her  beautifuller 
Than  Leah,  or  than  Ruth,  despite  her  fatness, 
But  he  was  an  old  man,  gentle  and  kind, 
And  from  reading  in  the  Talmud  nearly  blind. 

33. 

Rachel  and  he  had  come  where  the  roads  fork. 
She  was  a  modern.    His  was  the  old  law. 
It's  hard  with  naught  but  teeth  to  pull  a  cork, 
It's  hard  for  youth  to  view  old  worth  with  awe, 
It's  hard  to  be  religious  in  New  York. 
His  happiness  had  only  known  one  flaw — 
She  made  a  point  of  being  extra  chipper 
All  through  the  celebration  of  Yom  Kippur. 

34. 

Sophia  found  her  an  enchanting  thing, 
Full  of  suggestions  pseudo-oriental. 
It  was  delight  to  her  'neath  Rachel's  wing 
To  chase  ideas  small  and  sentimental, 
And  sing  her  song  and  fling  her  little  fling. 
And  Rachel  was  so  comfortable  and  gentle 
That  I  am  much  inclined  to  wonder  whether 
A  softer  pair  of  softs  e'er  came  together. 

35. 

They  were  inseparable.    They  shared  in  all 
There  was  to  share  of  pleasure  and  of  lore. 
They  went  to  concerts  in  Carnegie  Hall. 
Theirs  was  one  passion  for  Jack  Barrymore. 
They  heard  Caruso  bay  and  Garden  squall. 
And  Noyes  and  Masefield  thrilled  them  to  the  core 
When  night-gown  clad  they  yielded  to  the  spell 
Of  many  a  verse  and  many  a  caramel. 


12  SOPHIA   TRENTON 

36. 

And  so  Sophia  grew  a  Sophomore, 
Emerging  moth-like  from  the  gray  cocoon 
Of  pale  freshwomanhood.    And  in  a  score 
Of  ways  she  showed  it.   The  soft  airs  of  June 
Brought  her  on  rapidly.    The  Minotaur 
Of  Education  does  not  strike  too  soon. 
When  the  victim's  lost  in  labyrinthine  ways, 
Leaping  from  ambush,  if  he  can  he  slays. 

37. 

Now  she  must  choose  her  specialty.    Of  course 
She  stuck  to  Percy  and  the  School  Romantic, 
Drawn  to  the  man  by  some  vague  moral  force, 
And  the  hope  that  if  her  effort  proved  gigantic, 
He  might  perhaps  her  dearest  wish  endorse, 
Which  swelled  like  the  circulation  of  the  "Atlantic," 
And,  grant  her — O  Wagon  hitched  to  what  a  star — 
Admission  to  his  Shelley  seminar, 

38. 

When  in  due  season  she  should  graduate. 
Professor  Percy  kept  an  eye  upon  her. 
He  found  her  admiration  adequate, 
A  sentiment,  he  felt,  which  did  her  honor. 
So  when  revolving  years  brought  round  the  date, 
And  the  President's  scrawled  turkey-tracks  were  on  her 
Parchment,  and  a  moderate  modiste  had  fitted  her 
Sprigged  graduation  muslin,  he  admitted  her. 

39. 

And  all  that  summer  for  twelve  golden  weeks 
Little  Sophia  Trenton  walked  on  air, 
Having  been  admitted  to  that  class  of  freaks, 
Nicknamed  by  Percy's  chief,  who  had  a  flair 
For  pun  and  epigram,  "Percy's  Reliques," 
So  many  cast  school-mistresses  came  there, 
So  many  brainless  intellectuals  drifting 
Midway  between  makeshifting  and  uplifting. 


A   MORAL   POEM  13 

40. 

September  came  once  more.    And  with  September 
Sophia  to  her  oracle  returned, 
Sunburnt,  and  full  of  ardor  to  dismember 
Shelley  till  all  his  mystery  she  discerned. 
In  the  seminar  she  blew  the  little  ember 
Of  dumb  enthusiasm  till  it  burned. 
But  there  was  too  much  mental  C  O2, 
So  even  Sophia's  flame  was  rather  blue. 

41. 

At  the  yellow  table-end  delivering  doom 
Sate  Percy,  chin  on  hand,  calm  mid  their  vaporing. 
His  brow,  deep  scars  of  intellectual  gloom 
Had  temporarily  entrenched.    Such  capering 
As  made  him  famous  in  the  lecture-room 
He  scorned,  having  now  the  air  of  one  wall-papering 
With  perfect  taste  the  chambers  of  the  soul. 
They  worshipped  him  in  this  severer  role. 

42. 

The  papers  that  they  wrote,  they  read,  alas ! 
There  was  much  talk  of  source  and  bibliography. 
Sophia  overwhelmed  the  wondering  class 
With  a  bright  specimen  of  the  new  monography, 
The  subject  chosen  by  herself.    It  was 
Entitled  "Shelley's  Knowledge  of  Geography." 
Percy,  in  whom  Shelley  ne'er  stirred  one  pulse, 
Praised  the  design,  but  doubted  the  results. 

43. 

Here  let  me  state  in  categoric  terms 
That  though  he  swayed  her  with  a  power  hypnotic 
As  a  snake's  when  toward  the  warbler's  nest  he  squirms, 
Her  mind  contained  no  trace  of  the  erotic. 
The  blow-fly  does  not  mate  with  angle-worms. 
Moreover,  Percy  had  a  wife  despotic 
And  moral,  who,  I  am  reasonably  sure 
Would  never  have  permitted  an  amour. 


14 SOPHIA   TRENTON 

44. 

But  mentally  she  grew  his  odalisk, 
A  slave  in  his  belles-letterish  hareem. 
His  bland  reproof  she  no  more  dared  to  risk, 
Than  to  have  practiced  with  the  football  team. 
An  asteroid,  at  due  distance  from  the  disk 
Of  its  great  primary,  would  sooner  dream 
Of  breaking  from  its  orbit  some  fine  day, 
And  doing  business  in  the  Milky  Way, 

45. 

Than  would  Sophia  of  venturing  an  opinion 
Professor  Percy  had  not  guaranteed 
As  sterling  currency  in  the  dominion 
Of  Literature.    His  verdict  was  her  creed. 
Italians  fleeing  from  the  Abyssinian 
Or  Austrian  onslaught  never  paid  more  heed 
To  personal  safety  than  Sophia  paid 
To  Percy's  literary  gasconade. 

46. 

This  he  saw  quickly,  and  he  told  his  wife 
Of  the  dimensions  of  his  influence 
Upon  his  students,  how  he  waked  to  life 
And  stirred  the  sleepy  channels  of  their  sense 
Till  they  were  fit  for  intellectual  strife. 
He  did  not  tell  her,  though,  that  accidents 
Even  in  that  bloodless  struggle  find  a  place, 
And  the  ghost  of  shame  and  the  shadow  of  disgrace. 

47. 

His  consort  snorted  as  she  combed  her  hair. 
She  had  heard  all  that  before  and  was  inclined 
To  say  so,  but,  deciding  to  forbear, 
Got  into  bed,  apparently  resigned 
To  listen  to  his  tale  of  how  and  where 
A  thesis-subject  came  into  his  mind, 
On  which  to  date  no  specialist  had  hit, 
And  how  Sophia  had  just  jumped  at  it. 


A    MORAL   POEM 15 

48. 

Sophia  had  in  fact,  as  leaps  the  trout 
Besprent  with  rainbow  dyes,  leaped  from  the  stream 
Pedantic  at  the  fly,  with  never  a  doubt, 
Though  it  was  a  brown  hackle  of  a  theme 
That  in  her  innocence  she  singled  out. 
A  change  came  o'er  the  spirit  of  her  dream. 
There  was  a  shining  goal  in  sight,  and  she 
Resolved  to  labor  for  a  Ph.  D. 

49. 

Her  thesis  was — I  have  forgot — no  matter ! 
Something  she  had  decided  to  demonstrate. 
Wreaths  about  Shelley's  urn  she  yearned  to  scatter, 
Though  the  victim  had  he  known  might  well  remonstrate. 
For,  though  in  some  ways  madder  than  a  hatter, 
In  normal  times  he  had  his  headpiece  on  straight, 
And  both  his  eyes  had  in  fine  frenzy  rolled, 
If  ever  in  his  life  he  had  been  told 

50. 

That  dryasdusts  would  moralize  his  song, 
Reading  the  meaning  out  and  Plato  in, 
Interpreting  the  simplest  symbol  wrong, 
Missing  the  gold  and  treasuring  the  tin, 
Dwelling  upon  the  trivial  so  long, 
And  spinning  allegory  out  so  thin 
That  the  line  parts,  and  neither  brawn  nor  brain 
Can  splice  the  mainbrace  of  the  mind  again. 

51. 

What  was  the  theme  that  Percy  had  suggested  ? 
Aha !  I  have  it.    The  investigations 
Of  Dowden  left  one  area  uninfested, 
Namely,  Shelley  in  his  musical  relations. 
Sophia  her  small  capital  invested, 
After  some  most  inspiring  conversations 
With  Percy,  in  this  cramped  and  arid  field, 
Which  gave  no  promise  of  a  ten-fold  yield. 


16 


52. 

Ah,  smile  not !  There  are  theses  yet  absurder 
Than  poor  Sophia's  pile  of  tinsel  tissue. 
They  move  the  man  of  common  sense  to  murder 
Not  only  the  perpetrator  but  his  issue. 
When  folly  speaks,  be  sure  the  fools  have  heard  her. 
And  if  you  don't  believe  me,  then  I  wish  you 
Would  read  a  thesis  that  displays  to  us 
Wagner's  indebtedness  to  Aeschylus. 

53. 

Sophia's  plan  was  this.    She  catalogued 
Exhaustively  the  lines  where  Shelley  made 
Mention  of  music.     Shelley's  waterlogged 
With  music.    Through  the  sun  and  through  the  shade 
Unweariedly  his  winged  words  she  dogged. 
When  he  wrote  'melody,'  or  'serenade,' 
Or  'song,'  or  'Music  when  sweet  voices  die,' 
She  tagged  them  all  for  reference  bye  and  bye. 

54. 

Heard  melodies  are  sweet,  but  those  unheard 
To  her  were  sweeter.    Soon  she  could  detect 
Under  the  mask  of  almost  any  word 
Allusion  to  a  musical  effect. 
She  tortured  opposites  till  they  concurred 
In  sense  the  poet  never  could  suspect. 
And  the  work  sped,  and  she  was  never  weary 
Of  her  new  musical-aesthetic  theory. 

55. 

She  drew  an  interesting  parallel 
Between  his  songs  and  arias  from  Gltick 
Whose  Orpheus  drew  Eurydice  from  Hell, 
Yet  lost  her  by  an  inadvertent  look. 
Haydn  and  Handel  played  their  part  as  well. 
Beethoven  cut  a  figure  in  her  book. 
She  showed — the  exposition  was  a  gem — 
In  what  light  Shelley  had  regarded  them. 


A    MORAL   POEM 17 

56. 

And  she  was  happy  laboring  day  by  day 
With  Percy's  bland  approval  for  a  spur. 
Only  one  obstacle  before  her  lay, 
And  it  was  of  a  sort  that  troubled  her, 
For  Rachel  Stein  her  friend  had  gone  away 
And  much  she  missed  her  plump  philosopher, 
Who  was  in  love  with  a  pale,  ineffectual, 
And  unattractive  Christian  intellectual, 

57. 

Who  loved  the  human  race,  himself  in  chief. 
Sophia,  sorting  literary  rubble, 
Often  gave  way  to  sympathetic  grief, 
As  she  thought  about  poor  Rachel  and  her  trouble. 
She  would  have  died  to  give  her  some  relief, 
To  have  gained  her  wish,  or  prick  the  silly  bubble 
Of  Rachel's  tragic  amorous  eccentricity, 
But  could  do  nothing,  which  was  her  felicity. 

58. 

Another  trouble  soon  upon  her  grew. 
The  thunder  of  those  battles  over  sea 
With  which  America  had  naught  to  do, 
Ruffled  her  meditation  fancy  free. 
She  dreamed  of  them,  although  she  held  the  view 
That  both  sides  were  as  guilty  as  could  be. 
This  theory,  by  the  way,  she  had  acquired 
From  Rachel  and  the  man  Rachel  admired, 

59. 

Who,  though  he  was  the  weakest  of  weak  sisters, 
Yet  was  in  this  consistent,  for  he  bragged 
That  he  would  be  most  passive  of  resisters, 
If  into  war  America  were  dragged. 
And  his  tongue  soon  had  callouses  and  blisters 
From  being  so  perpetually  wagged 
And  twisted  into  the  convenient  attitudes 
Appropriate  to  pacifistic  platitudes. 


18 SOPHIA   TRENTON 

60. 

Our  intellectual's  name  was  Dana  Phipps, 
And  naturally  his  mind  so-called,  was  cluttered 
With  phrases  that  came  glibly  from  the  lips. 
But  poor  Sophia  felt  that  he  had  uttered 
Much  that  was  true.    Though  at  this  point  he  slips 
From  the  tale,  she  often  pondered,  as  she  puttered 
At  her  notes,  on  his  acuteness,  and  the  craft 
With  which  he  finally  outran  the  draft. 

61. 

The  folded  buds  of  Nineteen-seventeen 
Brought  spices  to  the  April  day  again, 
But  few  beheld  that  avenues  were  green, 
And  the  bright  Spring  come  in.    Men  saw  too  plain 
What  lay  before,  and  all  that  it  must  mean, 
The  slaughter,  and  the  pestilence,  and  pain, 
And  the  hawk  famine  on  destruction's  fist. 
They  saw  it  all — and  hastened  to  enlist. 

62. 

The  river  filled  with  ships  that  passed  by  night, 
Unseen  and  silent  as  a  thief  may  come, 
Slinking  down  the  darkling  flood  without  a  light. 
The  college  woke  to  trumpet  and  to  drum, 
And  dressed  itself  in  khaki  trig  and  tight. 
And  overhead  Sophia  heard  the  hum 
Of  aeroplanes  that  dropped  on  the  bystander 
A  thousand  flying  leaves  of  propaganda. 

63. 

Sophia's  heart  was  somehow  not  inclined 
To  labor  on  amid  that  martial  bustle. 
She  felt  as  though  she  had  been  left  behind 
And  never  would  catch  up  without  a  hustle. 
But  Percy  reassured  her  wavering  mind. 
With  fresh  conviction  she  began  to  tussle 
With  piles  of  references  as  before, 
While  Young  America  went  off  to  War. 


A   MORAL   POEM 19 

64. 

Then  one  June  evening  as  she  journeyed  lone 
Over  a  quite  unusually  arid 
Desert  of  notes,  where  not  the  whitened  bone 
Remained  of  any  poor  idea  miscarried, 
Her  landlady  called  out,  "Miss  Trenton — 'phone !" 
A  voice  said :   "I  am  going  to  be  married. 
It's  Rachel,  dear.    Tonight !    We  had  no  warning — 
Come  right  away.    He  sails  tomorrow  morning." 

65. 

Half  an  hour  later  mild  Sophia  found 
Herself  in  Rachel's  new  and  shining  flat. 
Upon  the  hatrack  as  she  gazed  around 
She  saw  a  spick  and  span  new  service-hat. 
Rachel — an  unknown  Rachel — trimly  gowned, 
And  radiant,  and  very  much  less  fat, 
Swept  in.    There  was  a  new  light  in  her  eyes. 
She  had  been  looking  at  realities. 

66. 

And  close  behind  her  in  the  garb  of  war 
A  really  quite  magnificent  young  Jew, 
A  sergeant  in  the  quartermaster  corps. 
Oh  Dana  Phipps !  The  heart  that  ached  for  you, 
I'm  reasonably  sure  will  ache  no  more. 
Rachel  with  an  ecstatic  gurgle  threw 
Her  arms  about  Sophia.    The  embrace 
Made  up  in  vigor  what  it  lacked  in  grace. 

67. 

Weddings  in  Nineteen-seventeen  were  swift. 

Rachel  and  Moe  Rabinovitch  were  wed 

Swiftly  as  any.   The  apartment-lift 

Bore  them  downstairs.     The  waiting  taxi  fled 

To  some  hotel.    A  momentary  rift 

Let  light  fall  on  them  through  the  clouds  of  dread, 

Grimly  upon  their  marriage-night  withdrawn. 

Eight  hours  were  theirs.    His  leave  was  up  at  dawn. 


20 SOPHIA   TRENTON 

68. 

The  hollow  subway  roared  and  clamored  round 
Sophia.    Rachel's  grief  and  exaltation 
Shocked  her  almost,  as  pensive,  homeward  bound, 
She  gave  a  loose  to  her  imagination. 
Life  seemed  a  riddle  rather  too  profound 
To  be  good  taste.    She  almost  passed  her  station, 
She  was  so  lost  in  thought.  I  can't  say  why 
Sophia  felt  greatly  inclined  to  cry. 

69. 

But  her  hands  shook  as  she  unloosed  her  hair, 

Alone  before  the  mirror  in  her  room. 

And  the  dumb  shadows  shifting  here  and  there 

Filled  her  with  vague  presentiments  of  gloom. 

The  present  seemed  as  empty  as  despair, 

The  future  as  productive  as  a  tomb. 

A  dry  sob  shook  her  maiden  diaphragm. 

She  went  to  bed  and  slumbered  like  a  lamb. 

70. 

Next  morning  she  was  at  her  task  once  more. 
As  a  weed  floats  in  with  the  tide,  so  did 
Her  thesis  float  in  with  the  tide  of  war. 
To  change  the  figure,  her  ephemerid 
Developed  fast.    Its  larval  stage  was  o'er. 
Soon  it  must  issue  from  the  chrysalid, 
And  undertake  the  adventure  that  awaits 
All  inarticulate  invertebrates. 

71. 

She  passed  her  doctorate  examination. 

Percy  presided  over  two  or  three 

Faint  colleagues,  who  possessed  no  information 

Apt  to  embarrass  in  the  least  degree. 

Though  she  had  thrilled  with  dreadful  expectation, 

She  met  the  test,  and  I  may  say  that  she 

Created  a  distinctly  good  impression 

Of  quiet  and  painstaking  self-possession. 


A    MORAL   POEM 21 

72. 

And  yet  her  soul  misgave  her,  for  the  book 
That  went  at  last  to  the  Columbia  Press 
Had  in  the  galley-proof  to  her  a  look 
Of  dull  and  real  ineffectiveness. 
Percy,  to  whom  her  troubled  heart  she  took, 
Laughed  lightly  at  her  symptoms  of  distress, 
And  when  he  had  their  origin  inquired, 
Said  with  some  sympathy  that  she  was  tired. 

73. 

He  was  in  fact  the  cause  of  her  fatigue, 

Though  neither's  thought  wandered  in  that  direction. 

He  had  meshed  her  in  a  spiritual  intrigue, 

Where  plodding  pedantry  replaced  affection 

And  humor  and  all  things  that  are  in  league 

With  natural  youth.    The  months  of  proof-correction 

Past  in  processional  of  pages  rolled, 

That  made  Sophia  feel  chilly  and  grown  old, 

74. 

And  as  if  she  had  missed  much.    At  last  her  book 
Came  out  full-blown.    It  did  not  cause  a  ruction. 
Physically  it  had  a  solid  look. 
A  thing  that  lived  by  literary  suction, 
A  critic  namely,  kindly  undertook 
To  puff  it.    He  quoted  from  the  introduction 
And  quit.    Less  florid  scribes  a  value  set 
Upon  the  work,  to-wit,  "Three  dollars  net." 

75. 

A  pebble  cast  into  the  central  sea 
Would  drive  a  larger  wave  against  the  beach 
Of  the  utmost  continent.    But  she  was  free 
From  laboring  after  things  beyond  her  reach. 
Now  that  her  task  was  done,  she  hoped  that  she 
Might  have  an  opportunity  to  teach. 
But  Sophia,  when  she  put  the  millstone  by, 
Found  she  regained  her  freedom  with  a  sigh. 


22 SOPHIA   TRENTON 

76. 

And  like  a  wild  thing  tamed,  that  dares  not  go 
Far  from  the  cage,  she  lingered  still  about 
The  seat  of  wisdom  she  had  come  to  know. 
The  whole  disastrous  world  was  wild  without. 
But  here  all  things  were  gradual  and  slow, 
And  one  was  left  at  liberty  to  doubt 
Whether  one's  views  on  Shelley  were  of  such 
Importance  as  to  matter  very  much. 

77. 

All  that  red  Fall  Sophia  dwelt  alone 
And  solitary  in  her  cloister  pale. 
Then  one  dull  evening  the  cracked  telephone 
Rang.    It  was  Rachel's  voice.    A  broken  wail 
Came  over  the  wire.  The  agonizing  tone 
Pierced  through  Sophia  like  a  red-hot  nail. 
There  was  another  casualty  she  knew. 
What  did  it  matter,  fire,  or  flood,  or  'flu'  ? 

78. 

In  the  downtown  flat  she  found  wild  Rachel  weeping, 
As  once  in  Ramah,  not  to  be  comforted, 
Amid  a  general  wreck  of  light  housekeeping. 
Sophia  somehow  got  her  into  bed. 
And  when,  collapsed,  Rachel  at  length  was  sleeping, 
She  washed  the  dishes,  picked  things  up,  and  read 
A  telegram,  delivered  in  the  mail, 
Containing  no  elaborate  detail. 

79. 

Three  dreadful  days  Sophia  nursed  the  wraith 
Of  Rachel,  and  found  her  ministry  exciting, 
For  washing  dishes  in  the  house  of  death 
Beats  any  quantity  of  thesis-writing. 
She  drew  more  ardently  a  fiercer  breath, 
Like  one  among  the  captains  and  the  fighting. 
On  the  fourth  day  she  sped  up  town  in  haste, 
To  get  a  nightgown  and  a  clean  shirt-waist. 


A   MORAL   POEM  23 

80.     . 

And  as  she  went  across  town  to  her  train, 
With  Rachel  in  her  thought,  and  Rachel's  woe, 
The  passing  crowd  went  suddenly  insane. 
A  soldier  yelled,  "I  tell  you  it  is  so." 
Sirens  began  to  scream  like  souls  in  pain. 
From  office-windows,  like  a  storm  of  snow, 
On  the  Autumn  air  came  drifts  of  paper  falling 
O'er  paranoiacs  bellowing  and  bawling 

81. 

That  the  war  was  over.  Soldier-boys  rocked  high 

On  the  shoulders  of  a  crowd  of  yelling  'gobs.' 

Street-girls,  with  meretricious  hair  awry 

And  tear-tracked  rouge,  laughed  shrill  between  their  sobs, 

And  waved  wild  arms  to  the  November  sky. 

And  hordes  and  hosts  and  multitudes  and  mobs 

Poured  up  Fifth  Avenue  with  career  and  caper 

Under  the  cataracts  of  fluttering  paper, 

82. 

That  like  the  nightmare  of  a  Ph.  D. 

From  the  thronged  windows  without  stint  descended, 

Swamping  the  asphalt  in  a  shallow  sea. 

The  city  raved  hysterical  and  splendid. 

Somehow  there  was  appalling  irony 

With  all  that  desperate  rejoicing  blended, 

For  it  takes  many  a  Moe  Rabinovitch 

To  tune  a  people  up  to  concert  pitch. 

83. 

False  tidings,  too !  Two  long  months  dragged  away. 
Rachel  at  last  began  somewhat  to  mend. 
Sophia,  who  had  nursed  her  night  and  day, 
Had  not  an  ounce  of  energy  to  spend, 
And  would  be  ill  if  she  prolonged  her  stay. 
She  kissed  the  forehead  of  her  stricken  friend, 
And  after  words  like  ointment  sweet  departed, 
Herself  most  comfortless  and  heavy-hearted. 


24 SOPHIA   TRENTON 

84. 

She  reached  her  room.    A  scanty  pile  of  mail 

Seemed  to  be  all  that  was  expectant  of  her, 

An  oil-promoter's  legendary  tale, 

Four  bills,  and  a  review  in  a  brown  cover. 

Wearily  she  unknotted  her  grey  veil, 

And  with  a  half  mechanic  hand  turned  over 

The  dreary,  drab,  manila-wrapped  collection, 

Which  promised  no  nepenthe  for  dejection. 

85. 

There  was  not  much  of  anything  to  do. 
She  felt  she  was  too  tired  to  go  to  bed. 
A  restless  lassitude  upon  her  grew, 
And  there  was  a  strained  feeling  in  her  head. 
With  trembling  hands  she  picked  up  the  review, 
And  without  thought  or  understanding  read, 
Till  with  a  shock  of  consciousness  she  came, 
Crusoe-like,  on  a  footprint — her  own  name. 

86. 

A  flying-man,  whose  inadvertent  'stall' 
Becomes  a  tail-spin,  knows  a  ghastly  thrill 
In  the  first  nick  of  the  appalling  fall, 
And  the  just  expectation  of  a  spill. 
I  do  not  say  Sophia  had  at  all 
The  same  emotion.    But  her  heart  stood  still 
As  death,  and  her  sad  eyes  filled  with  the  tears 
Of  all  the  backed-up  toil  of  seven  years. 

87. 

For  the  reviewer  violently  ripped 
The  veil  of  her  inconsequence  away. 
There  were  live  scorpions  on  the  lash  that  whipped 
Her  naked  spirit  in  the  light  of  day. 
Swift  came  the  arrowy  phrases  poison-tipped 
With  savage  indignation,  mixed  with  play 
More  savage  yet,  judgment  conjoined  with  gibe. 
He  held  to  the  tradition  of  his  tribe. 


A    MORAL   POEM 25 

88. 

What  hurt  most  was  a  sentence  at  the  end, 
Where  after  having  thoroughly  disjointed 
Her  frame  of  things,  he  felt  that  he  must  mend 
His  manners,  and  accordingly  anointed 
Her  wounds,  somewhat  in  the  manner  of  a  friend. 
She  quailed  before  that  pity  triple-pointed. 
He  said :   "Miss  Trenton's  venture  was  ill-starred. 
It  is  a  pity  she  has  worked  so  hard 

89. 

At  so  preposterous  a  task."    Sophia 

Dropped  the  three-column  page.   Could  such  things  be? 

Was  this  indeed  the  end  of  her  desire  ? 

Here  was  another  stroke  of  irony. 

A  landbird  when  his  storm-struck  pinions  tire 

Above  the  waste  of  infinite  purple  sea, 

And  he  sinks  fluttering  through  the  hopeless  air, 

Gives  way  to  no  more  innocent  despair. 

90. 

The  keystone  in  the  arch  of  her  distress 
Was  that  she  knew  the  gay  indictment  just, 
Good  measure  pressed  down,  neither  more  nor  less. 
On  what  a  quicksand  had  she  built  her  trust ! 
"A  gulf — a  void — sense  of  senselessness" 
Enclosed  her.    She  had  written  in  the  dust 
A  poor  scrawl,  which  the  whirlwind  from  the  waste 
Had  in  a  moment  utterly  effaced. 

91. 

With  an  "effort  like  an  athlete's"  she  choked  back 

The  sentimental  sob  of  her  self-pity. 

She  pulled  her  trunk  out  and  began  to  pack. 

She  would  depart  the  miserable  city. 

She  would  forget  that  she  had  been  a  hack, 

And  that  Percy  once  had  seemed  both  wise  and  witty. 

She  would  go  back  to  Schuyler  Falls  among 

The  morning-glories,  where  once  she  had  been  young. 


26  SOPHIA   TRENTON 

92. 

In  April  dogwood-trees  would  blossom  there 
And  the  young  beech  put  forth,  and  daffodils, 
She  knew,  that  come  before  the  swallows  dare, 
And  the  arbutus  patches  in  the  hills 
Would  take  with  beauty  soft  winds  everywhere. 
She  had  ground  so  long  at  these  mechanic  mills 
For  such  a  nugatory  amount  of  grist 
That  now  she  thought  it  proper  to  desist. 

93. 

There  were  some  books  that  must  be  carried  back 

To  the  librarian.  Without  delay 

She  snatched  them  up,  and  took  the  well-trod  track 

For  the  nine  hundredth  and  last  time.   Her  way 

Wound,  mid  the  architectural  bric-a-brac 

Collegiate,  through  a  lecture-hall  that  lay 

Across  her  path.    She  passed  an  open  door 

And  paused,  for  with  a  shock  she  heard  once  more 

94. 

A  mellow  voice  uplifted,  pleasant,  clear, 
That  uttered  many  a  seductive  phrase, 
Fitted  to  charm  the  undergraduate  ear, 
And  set  the  imagination  all  ablaze. 
"Shelley,"  the  voice  said,  "was  a  pioneer 
Of  spiritual  poetry,  whose  ways 
Lay  through  a  region  we  approach  with  awe." 
Sophia  looked  within  the  room  and  saw 

95. 

Amid  the  throng  a  girl  who  sat  enthralled, 

With  parted  lips  and  fascinated  eyes, 

And  now  and  then,  breathless  with  interest,  scrawled 

Something  that  struck  her  with  a  fresh  surprise. 

Pity  rose  in  her  as  the  seconds  crawled 

Into  the  overpast  eternities. 

Then  Percy  saw  her,  and  whether  from  repentance 

Or  other  reason,  staggered  in  his  sentence. 


A    MORAL    POEM  27 

96. 

Their  eyes  met.    But  he  saw  she  understood 
That  which  throughout  his  lifetime  he  had  striven 
To  hide.   She  knew  why  all  the  sallow  blood 
Flushed  in  his  cheek.    She  knew  that  he  had  driven 
Her  ship  ashore  amid  a  falling-  flood, 
And  what  was  even  more,  she  had  forgiven. 
That  hurts.    "My  word,"  she  thought,  "the  man's  a  bore." 
Smiling  she  turned  away  and  shut  the  door. 


STANFORD  UNIVERSITY   PRESS 


